Common Ground
by AquaTurquoise
Summary: Cedric meets the "Good Little Witch" Lucinda while he's attempting to gather ingredients for his spells in the garden. (A/N: The winner of the challenge from my last story was prof-shader, who was the first one to correctly identify the background in my cover photo. Therefore, this story is dedicated to you, Shader!)


Common Ground

Summary: Cedric meets the "Good Little Witch" Lucinda while he's attempting to gather ingredients for his spells in the garden.

Disclaimer: I do not own Sofia the First! :)

A/N: As prof-shader was the first person to guess correctly the background painting of the cover picture for "Cedric's Bad Day," I am now fulfilling this request of having Cedric and Lucinda meet. ;) I'd thought about it for a while actually and kept pushing it aside. Now I have a reason to explore this idea more. Thanks, Shader! :D PS—The answer was "The Persistence of Memory" by Salvador Dalí.

Cedric paused in his gathering several types of plants and herbs when he heard a strange "whoosh" sound blow past him. He looked around, frowning. He sensed something…not necessarily bad, but different for certain.

He shook off the feeling and returned to his task. If only he'd brought Wormwood for entertainment, but the raven was napping upstairs, and if Cedric knew anything it was not to wake his up his companion. The last thing he needed was a cranky bird on his hands.

A mischievous giggle cut through the silence and he paused again, looking around. "Sofia?" he asked, pretty sure it wasn't her since she was last seen studying for a test that she desperately needed to pass. He didn't understand. Magic was so second nature to her, but if she got a subject that was supposed to be easy, like royal history or something, she was hopeless. At least she had some help from Amber, who knew _everything_ there was to know about the subject at hand.

"Nope, try again," he heard a different voice say. Okay, this was clearly not his apprentice.

"Well, not to sound rude, Ms. 'I-like-to-play-games-with-the-royal-sorcerer-and-not-show-my-face,' but I have work to do. Please, if you are a friend of one of the princesses or Prince James, by all means, go visit them."

A young girl dropped down from what Cedric assumed was the tree under which he'd been situated, but the moment he caught sight of the broom in her hand, he had an idea that may not have been the case. "You're funny," she told him with a grin. "I'm Lucinda, a friend of Sofia's. And I'm guessing you're the grumpy sorcerer she's always talking about."

Cedric's mouth dropped. "Sofia called me _grumpy_?"

"No…her friends did though." She giggled at the annoyed look on his face. "Cedric, right?"

"That's 'Cedric the Sensational' to you, my dear girl, but yes…" He eyed her warily. "I've heard her speak of you before as well. You are the witch, correct?"

"I'm the 'good little witch.' I have a song and everything!" She smiled when he rolled his eyes, muttering something that sounded like, 'Who _doesn't_?' under his breath. "So what are you doing?"

"Why is it any of your concern?" he questioned, an eyebrow raised as he slowly returned to the task at hand.

"Gosh, you _are_ grumpy. Look, you're a sorcerer! You can do lots of things, just like me! We're a lot alike, I bet. Casting spells, playing pranks on people—"

"I'm going to stop you right there. I'm a _royal_ sorcerer. My job is to assist the king and his family with my abilities, and I take my job seriously. I don't do pranks…except on Baileywick occasionally, but that's another story entirely."

Lucinda smiled good-naturedly and hopped on her broom, allowing herself to hover a few feet from the ground. "You remind me of one of my uncles… He's kind of funny but so serious at the same time." She grinned. "Hey! I know! I'll call you Uncle Cedric!"

Cedric eyed her pointedly. "We are _not_ related."

"You don't know that! This is a big world, right? Who's to say we're not? Besides, with our similarities and everything, it's possible." Seeing him sigh in annoyance and attempt to focus, she hummed a little bit before saying, "You have really cool hair, by the way."

The sorcerer blinked and looked up at her. "Oh, um…thank you?" He actually chuckled as he unconsciously patted his bangs down. "It actually started out as a prank gone wrong thanks to another sorcerer, but it's kind of become a trademark I suppose."

"That's neat. Oh, by the way, _have_ you seen Sofia? I wanted to talk to her about a party I have coming up, but I couldn't find her anywhere."

"Nor will you. She's studying for an exam right now, and Princess Amber is overseeing everything." He smirked. "You'd be lucky to get past the guards right now, because when she is in charge, she takes things a little to the extreme."

Lucinda shrugged with a laugh. "I'd expect nothing less from a princess, I guess." She sighed. "Okay, well, I guess I'll talk with her later then. It was nice meeting you. And if you'd like, I could take you for a ride sometime." She grinned and patted the broom, making him shake his head.

"I'm not that great with heights sometimes, but I'm even worse when the possibility of falling is greater. No offense—I'm sure you're quite a capable flyer and everything, but I can't trust myself not to fall with my somewhat clumsy nature."

She giggled. "If you say so. But mark my words: one day I will get you to fly. You need to loosen up anyway, and there's nothing like the feeling of wind in your hair and leaving all your troubles and worries behind."

Cedric smiled thoughtfully and shrugged. "We'll see. No promises."

"Of course not." She laughed. "See you later, Uncle Cedric!" she called teasingly as she kicked off from the ground and flew away.

"I'm _not_ your uncle!" He sighed in exasperation and went back to gathering his ingredients, but he couldn't help chuckling at the meeting he'd just experienced. Maybe Sofia was right. Maybe some people weren't so bad after all.

The end

A/N: I hope you all liked this, especially you, prof-shader! I know how much you love Lucinda, and I wanted to do her justice! I hope I managed it. :) And the whole "Uncle Cedric" thing wouldn't get out of my head, so I just rolled with it. :D Who knows? It would be hilarious to me if the sister he mentioned in "Princess Ivy" actually turned out to be Lucinda's mom, even though that's highly unlikely since his parents are both sorcerers and not a warlock or witch. Then again, nothing would surprise me these days. Haha. With that, I bid you all farewell until next time! ~AquaTurquoise


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